Not your grama's cookin'

Spoiler Alert!

I made a brisket this week.  I’ll tell you the hows and such on Friday, as usual, but the brisket is sort of integral to what I’m about to say next, so sorry if I’ve sort of ruined the whole “reveal” on the Food in Review post.  I promise, there will be more than JUST brisket.  Especially after what I’m about to confess.

So, I made my very first brisket!  I was so excited to be making it.  My grama is the queen extraordinaire of southern oven-baked briskets.  She’s always told me to look for one with lots of fat still on it and cook it low and slow.  

I’ve had this brisket in my freezer since the end of the farmer’s market, and it seemed a good week to work meals around a brisket.  I cooked it for hours at 225-250ish (my oven sucks at holding a steady temp), and my house smelled delicious.  

At dinner time, I started to “disassemble” my brisket.  Right off the bat, something was wrong.  My fat hadn’t really shrunk any.  Grama’s disintegrates upon a single touch.  My meat was hard to cut.  Her’s doesn’t require cutting.  It actually took SO LONG to cut it that the meat got cold and I had to reheat our dinner portions.  

Horrible.  Tough.   Dry.  Upon my first,  I dropped my silverware in my plate, threw my face in my hands, and had to start doing some seriously focused breathing to keep from bursting into tears.  Another mediocre, barely edible dinner.  WTF?!  Oh my grama would be horrified at this monstrosity of a brisket!  

We ate it.  The flavor was actually quite nice, just the texture and chew-ability was all wrong.  It wans’t what I’d expected at all.  I’ll be attempting to salvage it by turning it into chopped beef (with a backup plan in case the chopped beef idea is also a total failure).  

I tell you all this to say.....bad meal happen.  Even to people who love to cook and cook often.  Just like the pancake debacle two Sundays ago (though I blame a bad recipe on that one).  My only saving grace is that idea that perhaps this brisket was a bad cut, but I got it from a good source.  So, I’m just going to take the hit on this one and call it a day.  Sometimes I make things that don’t turn out.  That doesn’t mean I’m a bad cook and should never try again.  It probably also doesn’t mean that I need to fling flatware and cry, but hey....I’m only human.  

Anyone got a kitchen disaster they’d like to share? 

Rain on my parade

So you know how when you're in love everything seems brighter? Then he asks you for you hand in marriage and you think "wow....life just doesn't get any better than THIS. Nothing can ruin this!" Well, let me save any of you who've thought this a bitter, bitter reality check. Life is still going to remain life. Also, as a teensy-weensy side note, weddings often bring things to the surface that you hoped to simply, oh, never deal with that has needed dealing with for quite some time. That could be family tensions, friendshhip tensions, grudges, estrangements........the list is long and arduous. The long and short of it is: whatever was unpleasant in your life BEFORE that moment will likely remain unpleasant AFTER that moment. Only now, you get the added benefit of having to worry about getting DIY projects done, paying Experts according to whichever schedule they've chosen to use, and lots and lots of emotions.

So be warned if you ever choose the "let's have a wedding" path! Life and the people in it will not change just because it will make you happy and make your wedding a more pleasant event.

But won't you feel a little wiser for having survived it?! Let us hope so. At the very least, I believe strife gives us the opportunity to show the very best in our character and bring us closer to the people we love (you know, that wonderful man that you're about to marry who is suffering through this with you).

Photo from Photobucket.